For Neowin, its been nearly 5 years of watching Microsoft bring new Windows versions, updating them, (sometimes) repackaging them with new titles ;-) and, following the disheartened voices of our members who complain about how long Windows XP took, how long Windows Codenamed Longhorn is taking and before we started (Neowin) I was able to view the same comments about Windows 95 up to the release Microsoft would rather forget, Windows Millennium.
Microsoft is now 30 years old and that is celebrated with a dedicated Microsoft Visitor Center Timeline page at Microsoft, since the major (consumer) release of Windows 95, I can safely say that Microsoft hasn"t gone a year without bringing its customers something new. Observe;
1995 - Windows 95A
1996 - Windows 95B
1997 - Windows 95C (OSR2)
1998 - Windows 98
1999 - Windows 98SE
2000 - Windows Millennium
2001 - Windows XP 2002 > 2005 - Windows XP "Tablet, Media, Editions"
So, ok for consumers, the second half of the 90"s was pretty hectic, while the first half of this decade has been a lot more quieter if you disregard the many XP flavours that followed the initial release of Windows XP. Since 2001 we"ve seen Windows XP Tablet, Media & the Preinstall Enviroment, at least one version of XP has made it to consumers since 2001. With the release of Media Center 2005 earlier this year, we have already been told we can expect Windows Longhorn in 2006, that fills the gaps pretty much.
Lets hope that when Longhorn releases it will be worth the wait for users like me, who have stuck with XP since 2001, making it "feel" like theres been nothing in between. Although my XP has seen a lot of improvement from the Gold release in October 2001.